If Earth has a twin somewhere out there, NASA has to find it.
That’s the conclusion of a once-in-a-decade report outlining astronomical priorities for the next decade. To find like that EarthSimilar to exoplanets, the report says, NASA should build a large and impressive new space telescope.
Every 10 years, the National Academies of Science, Engineering, and Medicine advise government agencies, such as NASA and the National Science Foundation, on what research goals astronomers should prioritize in the next decade, Reported by Space.com. Counselor released Latest Report On Thursday (November 4), he highlighted three key research priorities: to better understand the nature of black hole and neutron stars. to investigate how galaxies form and evolve; and identification of “inhabitable Earth-like worlds” and biochemical signs of life on other planetary systems.
On this last point, Fiona Harrison, an astrophysicist at Caltech who co-chairs the committee, Tell NPR“The extraordinary scientific opportunity that lies ahead in the coming decades is the possibility of finding life on other planets orbiting stars around our galaxy.”
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To find such a planet, the commission recommended that NASA build a telescope that dwarfs the Hubble Space Telescope and is equipped with infrared, optical, and ultraviolet sensors. The telescope will also carry a coronagraph, a telescopic accessory designed to block direct light from stars so that nearby objects can be seen. I mentioned Axios; Otherwise, the dim exoplanet might be obscured by the light of a neighboring star that is 10 billion times brighter than it is.
Axios reports that the telescope will cost about $11 billion to build and (ideally) be launched in the early 1940s.
With this telescope, “you don’t see continents on the planet’s surface… we’ll see different little dots,” Bruce McIntosh, Stanford astrophysicist and panel member, Tell Atlantic. Then, by analyzing the light reflected from an exoplanet, scientists can study the chemical composition of its atmosphere. atmosphere guide OxygenMethane and water could indicate the presence of life on the planet, though astronomers need to rule out other explanations for these chemical signals, such as volcanic activity.
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John O’Meara, committee member and chief scientist at the WM Keck Observatory, told Axios.
A decade ago, such missions would have been considered “little cakes in the sky,” Jonathan Fortney, a planetary scientist at the University of California, Santa Cruz and one of the panelists, told The Atlantic. But to date, scientists have identified more than 4,500 exoplanets, about 160 of which are rocky, like Earth.
With the ability to discover and analyze the atmospheres of distant worlds, “we have a way of starting to answer the question, ‘Are we alone?’” On the Committee, per NPR.
Originally published in Live Science.
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